David,
Glad to hear like the Metrohouses. We drove by your property a couple of weeks ago and it’s looking good. I admire the effort it must be taking to do it all from scratch. We didn’t have it in us, so the Modern-in-a-box concept has worked out well for us.
If you ever want to come by to say hello and have a closer look at the house, you’re quite welcome. We’re always excited to meet like-minded design-y people.

We were out of town when you (or your builder) had an open house a few months ago. We’d love to see it.

Yeah, that was actually my builder’s open house. He likes to have one every so often when a new property is completed. It helps him out, considering he doesn’t exactly have model homes to show people.
We’re available most all of the time, so just let me know when you’d like to come by. If you email directly, I’ll send you my mobile number. We look forward to seeing you at, um, well Levenstein House doesn’t exactly have the same modernist ring to it as Erwin House. Let’s just call it Twenty Fifteen.

The saga continues. My house and wife were on TV. Here’s a good example on how you can oversimplify and misrepresent a complex issue. So sad.
http://www.news8austin.com/content/top_stories/default.asp?ArID=162223

Ugh. Your house is anything but super-sized. What boneheads. And how weird is it to have someone from Hyde Park telling us what we can build in Crestview? It must be especially odd from the perspective of East Austin.

The more I discuss this issue with people, the more enraged I become. Grrr!

The builder contacted my wife about being interviewed, I believe to illustrate how young, educated, professionals are attracted to this type of urban density and lifestyle, as opposed to unchecked sprawl. So for starters, my house isn’t even representative of the worst offenders. They interviewed Hyde Park Lady seperately about the issue and didn’t even make it clear that my house isn’t even in her neighborhood. A little creative editing and it looks like she is directly rebutting my wife. Hyde Park Lady is obviously all caring and concerned about her neighborhood, while my wife crassly cares only about access to downtown bars and shopping. Eesh. Can we all not admit that this whole mess is really a class and style issue being thinly veiled behind some “objective” concerns about drainage? If Hyde Park Lady is so worried about extra cars, let her watch while builders and families are pushed out to the suburbs and create even more highways and traffic. She should be embracing builders like Metrohouse that work with actual architects and have some sensitivity to site plans, materials, and native landscaping, because the alternative is far less pretty. Like most people resisting smart growth and change by implementing quick-fix regulations, progress and history will roll right over her in the long term. End of rant (for now).

Are ya’ll on the Crestview or Brentwood listserves? There was an excellent post today about the issue, basically a city planner from MD who has been there, done that, and thought Austin was trying to implement a one-size-fits-all solution. Yet another reminder that urban planning should be done by professional urban planners, people who are driven by experience and not politics…

We are not on the listserves, but I’d be interested in reading that post. I seem to find myself getting slowly sucked into the guts of this issue.

Bruce,
Have you been participating on the “discussion board” the working group set up? Having yet another skeptical voice there makes it harder for these people to claim to City Council that they had unanimous support….
http://www.residentialregs.org/
Regards,
M1EK (thanks for the comment)